Dr Matthew Walmsley, chair of NHS South Tyneside Clinical Commissioning Group said: “I’d like to thank the hundreds of people who took the time to give their views about these important changes to local NHS services.

“With the public consultation phase now at an end, the clinical commissioning groups are now considering the feedback received during the public consultation period in order to inform our decision.”

This consideration includes the public feedback sessions, clinical workshops with members of the clinical services review group and workshops with the two CCG governing bodies. The process will finish with an extra-ordinary meeting in common of the governing bodies of the two clinical commissioning groups in February 2018. This meeting will be held in public and at which the two CCGs will make their final decisions regarding the future service configurations.

This period of intelligent consideration will last for one month from the publication of the consultation results.

Dr Ian Pattinson, chair of NHS Sunderland Clinical Commissioning Group said: “This feedback phase presents the public and stakeholders with a further opportunity to comment on the findings of the consultation and the proposed next steps.

“This enables opportunity for any further comments received from the public consultations or for other views or data to be considered. This opportunity also allows any alternative service models to be explored that may have been suggested via the consultation process.”

The public consultation is led by the commissioners of local health services – NHS South Tyneside Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG) and NHS Sunderland CCG. They are responsible for planning and buying healthcare services on behalf of patients.

Working in partnership with South Tyneside NHS Foundation Trust and City Hospitals Sunderland NHS Foundation Trust, who formed a strategic alliance in March 2016 known as ‘South Tyneside and Sunderland Healthcare Group’, all four NHS organisations are committed to delivering the best possible NHS services for the future through the Path to Excellence programme.

Members of the public have until Monday 8th January to given any further comments on the draft feedback via the path to excellence programme.

The consultation process has been independently reviewed by The Consultation Institute and found to be consistent with recognised standards of best practice.